Open Your Heart
by SilentPatronus
Summary: It's Jac's wedding day but when a face from the past turns up what will that do to her feelings and her emotions? One-shot.


I look at myself in the mirror and for the first time I think to myself 'I'm beautiful.' In the mirror I see a man enter the room. I turn to look at him and smile. He walks towards me and tells me I'm beautiful. He shouldn't be here. He should be with his family. He had turned up, uninvited, out of the blue. Why was he here?

There was a time when I'd have wanted him to turn up, tell me he loves me and whisk me off my feet. But now, I look at him and I see distant memories. Memories of pain and of love. But this love has dropped over time. All the scars and dents that were created by his touch now healed by another's. There was a time when I'd have said that this man was the love of my life, the only person I'd want to wake up next to each morning but back then I was vulnerable and naïve. I made mistakes.

If this man was worth it then he'd have accepted me for who I was, who I am. He would never have run off at the first possible chance. He would have helped me to heal, helped me to love and would never have betrayed me. He would never have left me so alone and afraid that I couldn't breathe. If he'd seen how he'd left me, how broken I was then maybe he'd understand.

But now was not the time, now was too late. I'd moved on. I was happy. I had made mistakes, but this time I'd been forgiven. Forgiven way too easily for my liking. It was as if I'd had my punishments early on in life. For once I was allowed to be happy.

I'd never let myself compare the two men in fear that I'd chosen the wrong path, for fear that my love now was not strong enough. But looking behind me to the man of my past only made it clearer. All those times I'd hidden, all those times I'd pretened everything was fine, lying through the skin of my teeth, it was for nothing. If I was going to do this then I was going to have to do this properly. I was going to have to break down my walls, and fall completely, irrevocably in love with him. Jonny.

I walked past the man of my past. I'd hardly uttered a word to him. He understood, our time had been and gone. I felt his eyes follow me out the room as I walked down the corridor to the other end. I knocked on a white door on the right and waited for a response. He opened the door, cursing as he did so; something about superstition. He looked into my eyes, sensing the pain, the urgency, he stepped aside and allowed me in. I signalled to the two that accompanied him in the room and the hastily exited leaving us alone.

I looked into his eyes and I felt safe, safer than I've ever felt before. His eyes on the surface were filled with concern, not surprising granted the situation. However, if you looked into them long enough, far enough, you would see the love, the happiness that he felt. I felt as if it would be all okay, yet now I had to talk. He deserved this. If he wanted to walk away after I'd understand but it was time. He needed to know my story. He nodded towards the bed. I sat down and began…

"I need you to be quiet. I need you to let me speak, let me finish the whole story before you respond." He nodded, I only half believed that he would do this in reality. He had the inability to keep his mouth shut you see. I looked into his eyes uncertain. He seemed puzzled, unsure of where this was going, although I believe he had waited a very long time for this explanation. After the countless times of asking me and my refusal to explain he'd given up. He never thought he would hear what was coming next.

I explained everything to him. How I never knew my father, how my mother abandoned me at the age of 12 and left me to grow up in care whilst she journeyed off round India returning only when she needed a kidney. How once she'd got that she abandoned me once again but not before I discovered that I had a half-sister and my grandfather who I'd been told was dead, was in fact very much alive. About Joseph, how I'd fallen in love with him yet entered a relationship with his married father to further my career. Through tears I managed to explain rape and sexual assault, and the time I was arrested.

Upon finishing I looked him in the eyes as the tears fell. He pulled his hand across my face to brush the tears off, and stroked my hair. He gave me a small smile knowing that words weren't needed and pulled me into a hug. We stayed there for what felt like hours before there was a knock at the door. It was time. He grabbed my hand and led me out of the room, down the corridor and stairs. He left me outside a room whilst he slipped inside. This was it.

If two years ago someone had told me that I'd be marrying Jonathan Maconie, a cheeky nurse I'd have laughed in their face. If someone had told me that in fact I was yet to meet my soul mate I would never have believed them. But here I am on my wedding day with a man who now knows everything there is to know. A man who brought life into me that I never knew existed. A man who saw what no one else could see and sought to find me. This man, Jonathan Maconie was mine and I was his. Today was a day I never thought would happen. Today I will become Mrs Maconie.


End file.
